Jen Howk

24/05/2025

Trying something a bit different this summer…for the last two years, Mildred the groundhog (and her multi-species friends) have really left me nothing in the garden. Baby seedlings stand no chance. Last year I didn’t get a single tomato, despite planting like six of them. She ate an entire garden bed full of nearly-ripe scarlet runner beans, she ate all my okra, all my corn….and forget about greens. She eats any and everything. So this year I’m embracing containers on the deck. Tomato, watermelon, zucchini, beans, and even grapes. (The grape vines I’ve planted are a favorite of the deer, so I haven’t been able to get any second year growth to actually bear fruit.) The deck isn’t quite as full sun as the garden but I’m optimistic. And of course I’m still putting a few things out in the garden too, we wouldn’t want Mildred to starve. Everything mulched with grass clippings from mowing paths through the wild meadow of a yard and fertilized with my own super special homemade vegan fermented plant sludge. We’ll see! (Let’s be real, this experiment is probably just a giant protected buffet for Gordo the squirrel 🐿️)

23/05/2025

It’s a very cool and rainy spring here but things are growing and it is never not amazing 😍 🌱

22/03/2025

After we got into this topic in the “Enough” group last week, I wanted to continue exploring the theme of family estrangement—and particularly mother/daughter estrangement—a bit more in my latest “Face of the Deep” episode (link in bio or on my YouTube channel—youtube.com/jenhowkAK).

In my experience both personally and in conversations with hundreds of women I have talked to over the years, the heart of estrangement is usually a profound feeling of invalidation. For the daughter, starting early in life it often feels as if her mother simply cannot tolerate her showing up as her full self, and she is forced to choose between maintaining a facade or increased distance as the price of inhabiting herself more truthfully and expansively. Estrangement from her mother, or from herself—she has to make an impossible choice.

For many of us (again, myself included) addiction—to food, to alcohol, or to other substances/behaviors—can be the bridge that allows us to avoid making that choice, or at least the appearance of it. But that only works for so long, and when we let the addictions go, increased tension can come to the surface.

I am not here to blame mothers. As many rush to point out, they didn’t have a rulebook, and they did the best they could. And, too, they almost always experienced exactly the same demands and undertook the same self-suppression in their own lives. Indeed, that *was* their rulebook, as it was mine until very recently. Intimidated and terrified into their own narrow role as a dutiful daughter, they in turn passed those same patterns and demands onto their daughters. But even though it was not intentional or malicious, it perpetuated generational harm. And that cycle needs to stop somewhere.

I am not here to blame either mothers or daughters, but I am here to challenge a taboo topic and interrupt the cycle—of demanding others behave in certain ways so we can feel safe, of rejecting parts of ourselves that threaten our attachments, and of turning toward addictive substances and behavior to manage the deep pain of all of it.

21/11/2024

For those of you who are interested in exploring your unconscious world and getting into shadow work through dreams and developing an active imagination practice, I’m starting a group in December that will meet each week to share dreams, dream interpretation, and other missives from those parts of us that might not yet be fully conscious. We will be using the wonderful new Jungian book “Dream Wise” as our guide for the journey, so it will be part book club/part practical application.

Dream work has been a hugely important part of my own self-development. Dreams are extraordinary tools for letting us know what we are missing, where we are growing and what we are heading into, and what we might be refusing to look at or acknowledge. Plus, it’s just really fun.

The group will be offered through my membership hub, the Collective Unconscious—which also includes access to my other weekly virtual groups and community. To sign up just go to the link in my bio or to collective.jenhowk.com. The group will be every Sunday for six weeks—replays will be available if you can’t make it live.

05/11/2024

On the occasion of Election Day.

Small and hidden is the door that leads inward, and the entrance is barred by countless prejudices, mistaken assumptions, and fears. Always one wishes to hear of grand political and economic schemes, the very things that have landed every nation in a morass. Therefore it sounds grotesque when anyone speaks of hidden doors, dreams, and a world within. What has this vapid idealism got to do with gigantic economic programmes, with the so-called problems of reality?

But I speak not to nations, only to the individual few, for whom it goes without saying that cultural values do not drop down like manna from heaven, but are created by the hands of individuals. If things go wrong in the world, this is because something is wrong with the individual, because something is wrong with me. Therefore, if I am sensible, I shall put myself right first. For this I need—because outside authority no longer means anything to me—a knowledge of the innermost foundations of my being, in order that I may base myself firmly on the eternal facts of the human psyche.” —Carl Jung

13/09/2024

Just a reminder that my book club/study group starts in just two days, this Sunday! The overarching theme is “Radical Truth-Telling as the Way Home.” We’ll be discussing one chapter of my book per week (2pm Eastern on Sundays.) The first week is called “Waking Up To Your Own Life.” It’s a blend of a course with a lecture from me at the beginning, homework assignments, and also group discussion during the calls.

Access is through my community hub at collective.jenhowk.com (link also in bio) which includes access to other good stuff, including my 3 virtual groups each week and community connections. Let me know if you have any questions below!

08/09/2024

Brutal. ✨

07/09/2024

I haven't posted here in four years (!!!!) so I thought I would just do a quick update about what I'm up to and where to find me. I've set up a new community hub at https://collective.jenhowk.com — the "Collective Unconscious." That's the best place to find updates and to get involved in all my various projects. As a curious open weirdo, I always have a lot going on! You can join as a free member and there are a lot of things available for free, but for $25/month there is access to a lot more.

Here are a few things you can find there:

* I wrote a book that came out a few months ago—"Truth Be Told." It's a little bit memoir, a little bit self-help, and mostly about the importance of radical honesty to personal growth. There's a book club/study group starting next week for said book—it will go deep with the core concepts and include weekly conversations and homework. It runs for eight weeks and you can learn more and join at the Collective! (There are also links to find and download the book or audiobook there too.)

* I have three regular virtual Zoom groups each week. A Wednesday group for food addiction/emotional eating, a Saturday group for general community chat, and a Sunday women's group. Access to all of these is also through the Collective.

* My podcast, "Face of the Deep," is aspirationally weekly but was on slight erratic hiatus over the summer with travel and other craziness. But I'll be getting back into a weekly schedule, and you can get early previews of it in the Collective.

My intention with this hub is to build genuine community—there are discussion threads and you can DM other members, and I'm adding new features all the time. If you have any questions you can ask here, and I hope to see you in the membership group soon!

Explore Start Here space in The Collective Unconscious

07/09/2024

Next Sunday (Sept 15) I’ll be kicking off an eight-week book club/study group for my book, “Truth Be Told.” Each Sunday for that eight weeks (11 pacific/2 eastern) we will cover one of the eight chapters in the book. I’ll start each session with an overview of key concepts, followed by a group discussion via zoom. There will be assorted “homework” and exercises to go deeper with the ideas, and a community forum to discuss things and connect with other participants in between. If you’d like to join, just sign up at https://collective.jenhowk.com — you can also just go to https://www.jenhowk.com and follow the menu option for "The Collective Unconscious." :)

Joining the community hub has other benefits too! It’s the new staging area for ALL of my work and projects, including early access to my podcast, access to my other weekly Zoom groups, and lots of other things I’m adding all the time.

If you haven't gotten the book yet, you can download the e-book or audiobook at https://jenhowk.gumroad.com — there is also a printed version available on Amazon.

I hope to see you in the book club! Replays will be included if you can’t make it live.